Blockchain Startup Adhara Snags $15M From ConsenSys

Banking privacy blockchain startup Adhara said Monday it is receiving a $15 million investment from blockchain firm ConsenSys.

Adhara is developing a multi-currency, liquidity management and international payments platform that is focused on financial services organizations in emerging markets. Adhara’s technology will allow these companies to balance their capital positions across borders faster and more cost efficiently.

Adhara said it will use tokenized fiat currency on Ethereum’s smart contract-enabled distributed ledger technology. The company has locations in South Africa, the UK and Spain. ConsenSys is a New York provider of blockchain and development consulting services.

The venture features a management team of banking and blockchain veterans. One of three co-founders, CEO Julio Faura, was founding chair of the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance and former head of blockchain at Santander. Edward Budd and Peter Munnings were the former chief digital officer at Deutsche Bank and former head of blockchain at FirstRand Bank in South Africa, respectively. Munnings also served as as the former ConsenSys lead on Project Khokha, an Ethereum-based project for processing interbank transactions more

The company’s development unit also has ample blockchain experience. “We have an excellent technical team who have worked for many years on enterprise ethereum solutions with banks and regulators including project Ubin with the Monetary Authority of Singapore and Project Khokha with the South African Reserve Bank,” Munnings said.

In a press release, Joseph Lubin, ConsenSys founder and Ethereum co-founder, alluded to the Adhara’s teams success with Khokha, which earned a FinTech & RegTech Award for Best Distributed Ledger Initiative from Central Banking, a global banking forum. “With Adhara, we are investing in a quality team that has a track record of delivery and we believe they can play a leading role in establishing the future of decentralised financial networks for regulated environments.”

Budd said Adhara was looking forward to working “with a select number of anchor partners to put the first phase of the Adhara vision into production.”